“A captive to my sword and to my lance, noble Captain,” replied the Clerk of Copmanhurst; “to my bow and to my halberd, I should rather say; and yet I have redeemed him by my divinity from a worse captivity. Speak, Jew — have I not ransomed thee from Sathanas? — have I not taught thee thy credo, thy pater, and thine Ave Maria? — Did I not spend the whole night in drinking to thee, and in expounding of mysteries?”
“For the love of God!” ejaculated the poor Jew, “will no one take me out of the keeping of this mad — I mean this holy man?”
“How’s this, Jew?” said the Friar, with a menacing aspect; “dost thou recant, Jew? — Bethink thee, if thou dost relapse into thine infidelity, though thou are not so tender as a suckling pig — I would I had one to break my fast upon — thou art not too tough to be roasted! Be conformable, Isaac, and repeat the words after me. Ave Maria! — ”
“Nay, we will have no profanation, mad Priest,” said Locksley; “let us rather hear where you found this prisoner of thine.”
“By Saint Dunstan,” said the Friar, “I found him where I sought for better ware! I did step into the cellarage to see what might be rescued there; for though a cup of burnt wine, with spice, be an evening’s drought for an emperor, it were waste, methought, to let so much good liquor be mulled at once; and I had caught up one runlet of sack, and was coming to call more aid among these lazy knaves, who are ever to seek when a good deed is to be done, when I was avised of a strong door — Aha! thought I, here is the choicest juice of all in this secret crypt; and the knave butler, being disturbed in his vocation, hath left the key in the door — In therefore I went, and found just nought besides a commodity of rusted chains and this dog of a Jew, who presently rendered himself my prisoner, rescue or no rescue. I did but refresh myself after the fatigue of the action, with the unbeliever, with one humming cup of sack, and was proceeding to lead forth my captive, when, crash after crash, as with wild thunder-dint and levin-fire, down toppled the masonry of an outer tower, (marry beshrew their hands that built it not the firmer!) and blocked up the passage. The roar of one falling tower followed another — I gave up thought of life; and deeming it a dishonour to one of my profession to pass out of this world in company with a Jew, I heaved up my halberd to beat his brains out; but I took pity on his grey hairs, and judged it better to lay down the partisan, and take up my spiritual weapon for his conversion. And truly, by the blessing of Saint Dunstan, the seed has been sown in good soil; only that, with speaking to him of mysteries through the whole night, and being in a manner fasting, (for the few droughts of sack which I sharpened my wits with were not worth marking,) my head is well-nigh dizzied, I trow. — But I was clean exhausted. — Gilbert and Wibbald know in what state they found me — quite and clean exhausted.”
“We can bear witness,” said Gilbert; “for when we had cleared away the ruin, and by Saint Dunstan’s help lighted upon the dungeon stair, we found the runlet of sack half empty, the Jew half dead, and the Friar more than half — exhausted, as he calls it.”
“Ye be knaves! ye lie!” retorted the offended Friar; “it was you and your gormandizing companions that drank up the sack, and called it your morning draught — I am a pagan, an I kept it not for the Captain’s own throat. But what recks it? The Jew is converted, and understands all I have told him, very nearly, if not altogether, as well as myself.”
“Jew,” said the Captain, “is this true? hast thou renounced thine unbelief?”
“May I so find mercy in your eyes,” said the Jew, “as I know not one word which the reverend prelate spake to me all this fearful night. Alas! I was so distraught with agony, and fear, and grief, that had our holy father Abraham come to preach to me, he had found but a deaf listener.”
“Thou liest, Jew, and thou knowest thou dost.” said the Friar; “I will remind thee of but one word of our conference — thou didst promise to give all thy substance to our holy Order.”
“So help me the Promise, fair sirs,” said Isaac, even more alarmed than before, “as no such sounds ever crossed my lips! Alas! I am an aged beggar’d man — I fear me a childless — have ruth on me, and let me go!”
“Nay,” said the Friar, “if thou dost retract vows made in favour of holy Church, thou must do penance.”
Accordingly, he raised his halberd, and would have laid the staff of it lustily on the Jew’s shoulders, had not the Black Knight stopped the blow, and thereby transferred the Holy Clerk’s resentment to himself.
“By Saint Thomas of Kent,” said he, “an I buckle to my gear, I will teach thee, sir lazy lover, to mell with thine own matters, maugre thine iron case there!”
“Nay, be not wroth with me,” said the Knight; “thou knowest I am thy sworn friend and comrade.”
“I know no such thing,” answered the Friar; “and defy thee for a meddling coxcomb!”
“Nay, but,” said the Knight, who seemed to take a pleasure in provoking his quondam host, “hast thou forgotten how, that for my sake (for I say nothing of the temptation of the flagon and the pasty) thou didst break thy vow of fast and vigil?”
“Truly, friend,” said the Friar, clenching his huge fist, “I will bestow a buffet on thee.”
“I accept of no such presents,” said the Knight; “I am content to take thy cuff42 as a loan, but I will repay thee with usury as deep as ever thy prisoner there exacted in his traffic.”
“I will prove that presently,” said the Friar.
“Hola!” cried the Captain, “what art thou after, mad Friar? brawling beneath our Trysting-tree?”
“No brawling,” said the Knight, “it is but a friendly interchange of courtesy. — Friar, strike an thou darest — I will stand thy blow, if thou wilt stand mine.”
“Thou hast the advantage with that iron pot on thy head,” said the churchman; “but have at thee — Down thou goest, an thou wert Goliath of Gath in his brazen helmet.”
The Friar bared his brawny arm up to the elbow, and putting his full strength to the blow, gave the Knight a buffet that might have felled an ox. But his adversary stood firm as a rock. A loud shout was uttered by all the yeomen around; for the Clerk’s cuff was proverbial amongst them, and there were few who, in jest or earnest, had not had the occasion to know its vigour.
“Now, Priest,” said, the Knight, pulling off his gauntlet, “if I had vantage on my head, I will have none on my hand — stand fast as a true man.”
“ Genam meam dedi vapulatori — I have given my cheek to the smiter,” said the Priest; “an thou canst stir me from the spot, fellow, I will freely bestow on thee the Jew’s ransom.”
So spoke the burly Priest, assuming, on his part, high defiance. But who may resist his fate? The buffet of the Knight was given with such strength and good-will, that the Friar rolled head over heels upon the plain, to the great amazement of all the spectators. But he arose neither angry nor crestfallen.
“Brother,” said he to the Knight, “thou shouldst have used thy strength with more discretion. I had mumbled but a lame mass an thou hadst broken my jaw, for the piper plays ill that wants the nether chops. Nevertheless, there is my hand, in friendly witness, that I will exchange no more cuffs with thee, having been a loser by the barter. End now all unkindness. Let us put the Jew to ransom, since the leopard will not change his spots, and a Jew he will continue to be.”
“The Priest,” said Clement, “is not half so confident of the Jew’s conversion, since he received that buffet on the ear.”
“Go to, knave, what pratest thou of conversions? — what, is there no respect? — all masters and no men? — I tell thee, fellow, I was somewhat totty when I received the good knight’s blow, or I had kept my ground under it. But an thou gibest more of it, thou shalt learn I can give as well as take.”
“Peace all!” said the Captain. “And thou, Jew, think of thy ransom; thou needest not to be told that thy race are held to be accursed in all Christian communities, and trust me that we cannot endure thy presence among us. Think, therefore, of an offer, while I examine a prisoner of another cast.”
“Were many of Front-de-Boeuf’s men taken?” demanded the Black Knight.
“None of note enough to be put to ransom,” answered the Captain; “a set of hilding fellows there were, whom we dismissed to find them a new master — enough had been done for revenge and profit; the bunch of them were not worth a cardecu. The prisoner I speak of is better booty — a jolly monk riding to visit his leman, an I may judge by his horse-gear and wearing apparel. — Here cometh the worthy prelate, as pert as a pyet.” And, between two yeomen, was brought before the silvan throne of the outlaw Chief, our old friend, Prior Aymer of Jorvaulx.
Chapter 33
—— Flower of warriors,
How is’t with Titus Lartius?
MARCIUS. — As with a man busied about decrees,
Condemning some to death and some to exile,
Ransoming him or pitying, threatening the other.
Coriolanus
The captive Abbot’s features and manners exhibited a whimsical mixture of offended pride, and deranged foppery and bodily terror.
“Why, how now, my masters?” said he, with a voice in which all three emotions were blended. “What order is this among ye? Be ye Turks or Christians, that handle a churchman? — Know ye what it is, manus imponere in servos Domini? Ye have plundered my mails — torn my cope of curious cut lace, which might have served a cardinal! — Another in my place would have been at his excommunicabo vos; but I am placible, and if ye order forth my palfreys, release my brethren, and restore my mails, tell down with all speed an hundred crowns to be expended in masses at the high altar of Jorvaulx Abbey, and make your vow to eat no venison until next Pentecost, it may be you shall hear little more of this mad frolic.”
“Holy Father,” said the chief Outlaw, “it grieves me to think that you have met with such usage from any of my followers, as calls for your fatherly reprehension.”
“Usage!” echoed the priest, encouraged by the mild tone of the silvan leader; “it were usage fit for no hound of good race — much less for a Christian — far less for a priest — and least of all for the Prior of the holy community of Jorvaulx. Here is a profane and drunken minstrel, called Allan-a-Dale — nebulo quidam — who has menaced me with corporal punishment — nay, with death itself, an I pay not down four hundred crowns of ransom, to the boot of all the treasure he hath already robbed me of — gold chains and gymmal rings to an unknown value; besides what is broken and spoiled among their rude hands, such as my pouncer-box and silver crisping-tongs.”
“It is impossible that Allan-a-Dale can have thus treated a man of your reverend bearing,” replied the Captain.
“It is true as the gospel of Saint Nicodemus,” said the Prior; “he swore, with many a cruel north-country oath, that he would hang me up on the highest tree in the greenwood.”
“Did he so in very deed? Nay, then, reverend father, I think you had better comply with his demands — for Allan-a-Dale is the very man to abide by his word when he has so pledged it.” 43
“You do but jest with me,” said the astounded Prior, with a forced laugh; “and I love a good jest with all my heart. But, ha! ha! ha! when the mirth has lasted the livelong night, it is time to be grave in the morning.”
“And I am as grave as a father confessor,” replied the Outlaw; “you must pay a round ransom, Sir Prior, or your convent is likely to be called to a new election; for your place will know you no more.”
“Are ye Christians,” said the Prior, “and hold this language to a churchman?”
“Christians! ay, marry are we, and have divinity among us to boot,” answered the Outlaw. “Let our buxom chaplain stand forth, and expound to this reverend father the texts which concern this matter.”
The Friar, half-drunk, half-sober, had huddled a friar’s frock over his green cassock, and now summoning together whatever scraps of learning he had acquired by rote in former days, “Holy father,” said he, “ Deus faciat salvam benignitatem vestram — You are welcome to the greenwood.”
“What profane mummery is this?” said the Prior. “Friend, if thou be’st indeed of the church, it were a better deed to show me how I may escape from these men’s hands, than to stand ducking and grinning here like a morris-dancer.”
“Truly, reverend father,” said the Friar, “I know but one mode in which thou mayst escape. This is Saint Andrew’s day with us, we are taking our tithes.”
“But not of the church, then, I trust, my good brother?” said the Prior.
“Of church and lay,” said the Friar; “and therefore, Sir Prior facite vobis amicos de Mammone iniquitatis — make yourselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness, for no other friendship is like to serve your turn.”
“I love a jolly woodsman at heart,” said the Prior, softening his tone; “come, ye must not deal too hard with me — I can well of woodcraft, and can wind a horn clear and lustily, and hollo till every oak rings again — Come, ye must not deal too hard with me.”
“Give him a horn,” said the Outlaw; “we will prove the skill he boasts of.”
The Prior Aymer winded a blast accordingly. The Captain shook his head.
“Sir Prior,” he said, “thou blowest a merry note, but it may not ransom thee — we cannot afford, as the legend on a good knight’s shield hath it, to set thee free for a blast. Moreover, I have found thee — thou art one of those, who, with new French graces and Tra-li-ras, disturb the ancient English bugle notes. — Prior, that last flourish on the recheat hath added fifty crowns to thy ransom, for corrupting the true old manly blasts of venerie.”
“Well, friend,” said the Abbot, peevishly, “thou art ill to please with thy woodcraft. I pray thee be more conformable in this matter of my ransom. At a word — since I must needs, for once, hold a candle to the devil — what ransom am I to pay for walking on Watling-street, without having fifty men at my back?”
“Were it not well,” said the Lieutenant of the gang apart to the Captain, “that the Prior should name the Jew’s ransom, and the Jew name the Prior’s?”
“Thou art a mad knave,” said the Captain, “but thy plan transcends! — Here, Jew, step forth — Look at that holy Father Aymer, Prior of the rich Abbey of Jorvaulx, and tell us at what ransom we should hold him? — Thou knowest the income of his convent, I warrant thee.”
“O, assuredly,” said Isaac. “I have trafficked with the good fathers, and bought wheat and barley, and fruits of the earth, and also much wool. O, it is a rich abbey-stede, and they do live upon the fat, and drink the sweet wines upon the lees, these good fathers of Jorvaulx. Ah, if an outcast like me had such a home to go to, and such incomings by the year and by the month, I would pay much gold and silver to redeem my captivity.”
“Hound of a Jew!” exclaimed the Prior, “no one knows better than thy own cursed self, that our holy house of God is indebted for the finishing of our chancel — ”
“And for the storing of your cellars in the last season with the due allowance of Gascon wine,” interrupted the Jew; “but that — that is small matters.”
“Hear the infidel dog!” said the churchman; “he jangles as if our holy community did come under debts for the wines we have a license to drink, propter necessitatem, et ad frigus depellendum. The circumcised villain blasphemeth the holy church, and Christian men listen and rebuke him not!”
“All this helps nothing,” said the leader. — “Isaac, pronounce what he may pay, without flaying both hide and hair.”
“An six hundred crowns,” said Isaac, “the good Prior might well pay to your honoured valours, and never sit less soft in his stall.”
“Six hundred crowns,” said the leader, gravely; “I am contented — thou hast well spoken, Isaac — six hundred crowns. — It is a sentence, Sir Prior.”
“A sentence! — a sentence!” exclaimed the band; “Solomon had not done it better.”
“Thou hearest thy doom, Prior,” said the leader.
“Ye are mad, my masters,” said the Prior; “where am I to find such a sum? If I sell the very pyx and candlesticks on the altar at Jorvaulx, I shall scarce raise the half; and it will be necessary for that purpose that I go to Jorvaulx myself; ye may retain as borrows44 my two priests.”
“That will be but blind trust,” said the Outlaw; “we will retain thee, Prior, and send them to fetch thy ransom. Thou shalt not want a cup of wine and a collop of venison the while; and if thou lovest woodcraft, thou shalt see such as your north country never witnessed.”
“Or, if so please you,” said Isaac, willing to curry favour with the outlaws, “I can send to York for the six hundred crowns, out of certain monies in my hands, if so be that the most reverend Prior present will grant me a quittance.”
“He shall grant thee whatever thou dost list, Isaac,” said the Captain; “and thou shalt lay down the redemption money for Prior Aymer as well as for thyself.”
“For myself! ah, courageous sirs,” said the Jew, “I am a broken and impoverished man; a beggar’s staff must be my portion through life, supposing I were to pay you fifty crowns.”
“The Prior shall judge of that matter,” replied the Captain. — “How say you, Father Aymer? Can the Jew afford a good ransom?”
“Can he afford a ransom?” answered the Prior “Is he not Isaac of York, rich enough to redeem the captivity of the ten tribes of Israel, who were led into Assyrian bondage? — I have seen but little of him myself, but our cellarer and treasurer have dealt largely with him, and report says that his house at York is so full of gold and silver as is a shame in any Christian land. Marvel it is to all living Christian hearts that such gnawing adders should be suffered to eat into the bowels of the state, and even of the holy church herself, with foul usuries and extortions.”
“Hold, father,” said the Jew, “mitigate and assuage your choler. I pray of your reverence to remember that I force my monies upon no one. But when churchman and layman, prince and prior, knight and priest, come knocking to Isaac’s door, they borrow not his shekels with these uncivil terms. It is then, Friend Isaac, will you pleasure us in this matter, and our day shall be truly kept, so God sa’ me? — and Kind Isaac, if ever you served man, show yourself a friend in this need! And when the day comes, and I ask my own, then what hear I but Damned Jew, and The curse of Egypt on your tribe, and all that may stir up the rude and uncivil populace against poor strangers!”
“Prior,” said the Captain, “Jew though he be, he hath in this spoken well. Do thou, therefore, name his ransom, as he named thine, without farther rude terms.”
“None but latro famosus — the interpretation whereof,” said the Prior, “will I give at some other time and tide — would place a Christian prelate and an unbaptized Jew upon the same bench. But since ye require me to put a price upon this caitiff, I tell you openly that ye will wrong yourselves if you take from him a penny under a thousand crowns.”
“A sentence! — a sentence!” exclaimed the chief Outlaw.
“A sentence! — a sentence!” shouted his assessors; “the Christian has shown his good nurture, and dealt with us more generously than the Jew.”
“The God of my fathers help me!” said the Jew; “will ye bear to the ground an impoverished creature? — I am this day childless, and will ye deprive me of the means of livelihood?”
“Thou wilt have the less to provide for, Jew, if thou art childless,” said Aymer.
“Alas! my lord,” said Isaac, “your law permits you not to know how the child of our bosom is entwined with the strings of our heart — O Rebecca! laughter of my beloved Rachel! were each leaf on that tree a zecchin, and each zecchin mine own, all that mass of wealth would I give to know whether thou art alive, and escaped the hands of the Nazarene!”
“Was not thy daughter dark-haired?” said one of the outlaws; “and wore she not a veil of twisted sendal, broidered with silver?”
“She did! — she did!” said the old man, trembling with eagerness, as formerly with fear. “The blessing of Jacob be upon thee! canst thou tell me aught of her safety?”
“It was she, then,” said the yeoman, “who was carried off by the proud Templar, when he broke through our ranks on yester-even. I had drawn my bow to send a shaft after him, but spared him even for the sake of the damsel, who I feared might take harm from the arrow.”
“Oh!” answered the Jew, “I would to God thou hadst shot, though the arrow had pierced her bosom! — Better the tomb of her fathers than the dishonourable couch of the licentious and savage Templar. Ichabod! Ichabod! the glory hath departed from my house!”
“Friends,” said the Chief, looking round, “the old man is but a Jew, natheless his grief touches me. — Deal uprightly with us, Isaac — will paying this ransom of a thousand crowns leave thee altogether penniless?”
Isaac, recalled to think of his worldly goods, the love of which, by dint of inveterate habit, contended even with his parental affection, grew pale, stammered, and could not deny there might be some small surplus.
“Well — go to — what though there be,” said the Outlaw, “we will not reckon with thee too closely. Without treasure thou mayst as well hope to redeem thy child from the clutches of Sir Brian de Bois-Guilbert, as to shoot a stag-royal with a headless shaft. — We will take thee at the same ransom with Prior Aymer, or rather at one hundred crowns lower, which hundred crowns shall be mine own peculiar loss, and not light upon this worshipful community; and so we shall avoid the heinous offence of rating a Jew merchant as high as a Christian prelate, and thou wilt have six hundred crowns remaining to treat for thy daughter’s ransom. Templars love the glitter of silver shekels as well as the sparkle of black eyes. — Hasten to make thy crowns chink in the ear of De Bois-Guilbert, ere worse comes of it. Thou wilt find him, as our scouts have brought notice, at the next Preceptory house of his Order. — Said I well, my merry mates?”
The yeomen expressed their wonted acquiescence in their leader’s opinion; and Isaac, relieved of one half of his apprehensions, by learning that his daughter lived, and might possibly be ransomed, threw himself at the feet of the generous Outlaw, and, rubbing his beard against his buskins, sought to kiss the hem of his green cassock. The Captain drew himself back, and extricated himself from the Jew’s grasp, not without some marks of contempt.
“Nay, beshrew thee, man, up with thee! I am English born, and love no such Eastern prostrations — Kneel to God, and not to a poor sinner, like me.”
“Ay, Jew,” said Prior Aymer; “kneel to God, as represented in the servant of his altar, and who knows, with thy sincere repentance and due gifts to the shrine of Saint Robert, what grace thou mayst acquire for thyself and thy daughter Rebecca? I grieve for the maiden, for she is of fair and comely countenance, — I beheld her in the lists of Ashby. Also Brian de Bois-Guilbert is one with whom I may do much — bethink thee how thou mayst deserve my good word with him.”
“Alas! alas!” said the Jew, “on every hand the spoilers arise against me — I am given as a prey unto the Assyrian, and a prey unto him of Egypt.”
“And what else should be the lot of thy accursed race?” answered the Prior; “for what saith holy writ, verbum Domini projecerunt, et sapientia est nulla in eis — they have cast forth the word of the Lord, and there is no wisdom in them; propterea dabo mulieres eorum exteris — I will give their women to strangers, that is to the Templar, as in the present matter; et thesauros eorum haeredibus alienis, and their treasures to others — as in the present case to these honest gentlemen.”
Isaac groaned deeply, and began to wring his hands, and to relapse into his state of desolation and despair. But the leader of the yeomen led him aside.
“Advise thee well, Isaac,” said Locksley, “what thou wilt do in this matter; my counsel to thee is to make a friend of this churchman. He is vain, Isaac, and he is covetous; at least he needs money to supply his profusion. Thou canst easily gratify his greed; for think not that I am blinded by thy pretexts of poverty. I am intimately acquainted, Isaac, with the very iron chest in which thou dost keep thy money-bags — What! know I not the great stone beneath the apple-tree, that leads into the vaulted chamber under thy garden at York?” The Jew grew as pale as death — “But fear nothing from me,” continued the yeoman, “for we are of old acquainted. Dost thou not remember the sick yeoman whom thy fair daughter Rebecca redeemed from the gyves at York, and kept him in thy house till his health was restored, when thou didst dismiss him recovered, and with a piece of money? — Usurer as thou art, thou didst never place coin at better interest than that poor silver mark, for it has this day saved thee five hundred crowns.”
“And thou art he whom we called Diccon Bend-the-Bow?” said Isaac; “I thought ever I knew the accent of thy voice.”
“I am Bend-the-Bow,” said the Captain, “and Locksley, and have a good name besides all these.”
“But thou art mistaken, good Bend-the-Bow, concerning that same vaulted apartment. So help me Heaven, as there is nought in it but some merchandises which I will gladly part with to you — one hundred yards of Lincoln green to make doublets to thy men, and a hundred staves of Spanish yew to make bows, and a hundred silken bowstrings, tough, round, and sound — these will I send thee for thy good-will, honest Diccon, an thou wilt keep silence about the vault, my good Diccon.”
“Silent as a dormouse,” said the Outlaw; “and never trust me but I am grieved for thy daughter. But I may not help it — The Templars lances are too strong for my archery in the open field — they would scatter us like dust. Had I but known it was Rebecca when she was borne off, something might have been done; but now thou must needs proceed by policy. Come, shall I treat for thee with the Prior?”
“In God’s name, Diccon, an thou canst, aid me to recover the child of my bosom!”
“Do not thou interrupt me with thine ill-timed avarice,” said the Outlaw, “and I will deal with him in thy behalf.”
He then turned from the Jew, who followed him, however, as closely as his shadow.
“Prior Aymer,” said the Captain, “come apart with me under this tree. Men say thou dost love wine, and a lady’s smile, better than beseems thy Order, Sir Priest; but with that I have nought to do. I have heard, too, thou dost love a brace of good dogs and a fleet horse, and it may well be that, loving things which are costly to come by, thou hatest not a purse of gold. But I have never heard that thou didst love oppression or cruelty. — Now, here is Isaac willing to give thee the means of pleasure and pastime in a bag containing one hundred marks of silver, if thy intercession with thine ally the Templar shall avail to procure the freedom of his daughter.”
“In safety and honour, as when taken from me,” said the Jew, “otherwise it is no bargain.”
“Peace, Isaac,” said the Outlaw, “or I give up thine interest. — What say you to this my purpose, Prior Aymer?”
“The matter,” quoth the Prior, “is of a mixed condition; for, if I do a good deal on the one hand, yet, on the other, it goeth to the vantage of a Jew, and in so much is against my conscience. Yet, if the Israelite will advantage the Church by giving me somewhat over to the building of our dortour,45 I will take it on my conscience to aid him in the matter of his daughter.”
“For a score of marks to the dortour,” said the Outlaw, — “Be still, I say, Isaac! — or for a brace of silver candlesticks to the altar, we will not stand with you.”
“Nay, but, good Diccon Bend-the-Bow” — said Isaac, endeavouring to interpose.
“Good Jew — good beast — good earthworm!” said the yeoman, losing patience; “an thou dost go on to put thy filthy lucre in the balance with thy daughter’s life and honour, by Heaven, I will strip thee of every maravedi thou hast in the world, before three days are out!”
Isaac shrunk together, and was silent.
“And what pledge am I to have for all this?” said the Prior.
“When Isaac returns successful through your mediation,” said the Outlaw, “I swear by Saint Hubert, I will see that he pays thee the money in good silver, or I will reckon with him for it in such sort, he had better have paid twenty such sums.”
“Well then, Jew,” said Aymer, “since I must needs meddle in this matter, let me have the use of thy writing-tablets — though, hold — rather than use thy pen, I would fast for twenty-four hours, and where shall I find one?”
“If your holy scruples can dispense with using the Jew’s tablets, for the pen I can find a remedy,” said the yeoman; and, bending his bow, he aimed his shaft at a wild-goose which was soaring over their heads, the advanced-guard of a phalanx of his tribe, which were winging their way to the distant and solitary fens of Holderness. The bird came fluttering down, transfixed with the arrow.
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